You can read the full back and forth with the government and a Vanguard rep, but it appears that Vanguard got a no-bid contract with a government body, a contract worth quite a lot of money:

- The anticipated spend under the contract with Vanguard for training,scoping and Phase 1 is £139,834. Cabinet approval has been granted inrespect of further funding up to £280,000. The City Council has securedfunding from the West Midlands Regional Improvement and EfficiencyPartnership of over £500,000 to support both the Vanguard work and othertransformational change programmes.

How does Vanguard justify a no-bid contract?

They claim, in a response:

Vanguard is the only provider who can provide the Vanguard Method."

Vanguard has fooled (?) the government into thinking there aren't other providers of Lean methods and other providers of "systems thinking."